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SHIPPEN  AND  WETHERILL 


TEACT. 


BY 

BENJAMIN  SMITE!  LYMAN. 


With  a  Geological  and  Topographical  Map. 


PHILADELPHIA : 

SHERMAN  &  CO.,  PRINTERS. 

1893. 


SHIPPEN  AND  WETHERILL 


TRACT. 


BY 

BENJAMIN  SMITH  LYMAN. 


With  a  Geological  and  Topographical  Map. 


PHILADELPHIA : 

SHERMAN  &  CO.  PRINTERS. 

1893. 


Ok 


T>^M^ 
I 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Report  on  the  Shippen  and  Wetherill  Tract, 5 

1.  Situation, 5 

2.  Lay  of  the  Land, 6 

3.  Geology, ...  7 

Structure, 7 

Eocks, 7 

4.  Coal  Beds, 10 

Mammoth  Coal  Bed, 10 

Palmer  Tunnel, 10 

Old  Air  Hole, 10 

Blew's  Slopes, 11 

Near  Old  Drift, '  .  .12 

Log  Eoad, 13 

West  End  of  Tract, 13 

Southwest,  .  .  .  . 14 

Average  Thickness,  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .15 

Outcrops, .  .15 

Quantity, 16 

Ten  Foot  Coal  Bed, 16 

Near  Blew's  Slopes, 16 

On  the  Log  Road, .17 

Other  Openings, 17 

Average  Thickness, .17 

Quantity, 18 

Buck  Mountain  Coal  Bed, 19 

Just  Outside  East  End  of  Tract,  .  .  .  .  .  .  .19 

Northeast  Hole,  .  . 19 

Road  Forks, 19 

Western  Hole,  .  .  . 20 

Crop  Boring, 20 

South  of  the  Tract, 21 

Neighboring  Mines, 21 

Average  Thickness, 22 

Quantity, 23 

Other  Coal  Beds, • 23 

Orchard  Coal  Bed, 23 

Primrose  Coal  Bed, 23 

Holmes  Coal  Bed, 24 

"  Top  Split  of  the  Mammoth," 24 

Drift  Coal  Bed, 26 

Spring  Coal  Bed, .  .27 

Lykens  Valley  Coal  Bed,  . 28 

5.  Summary  of  the  Workable  Coal 28 

6.  Mining  and  Shipment, 29 

7.  Map  and  Sections, 29 

An  occurrence  of  Coarse  Conglomerate  above  the  Mammoth  Anthracite  Bed,  .     32 


M553519 


EEPOUT  ON  THE  SHIPPEN  AND  WETHERILL  TRACT, 
SCHUYLKILL  TOWNSHIP,  SCHUYLKILL  CO.,  PA. 

BY   BENJAMIN    SMITH  LYMAN. 
(With  a  Geological  and  Topographical  Map.) 

1.  SITUATION. 

THE  Sliippen  and  Wetherill  Tract,  in  Schuylkill  township,  Schuyl- 
kill  county,  Pennsylvania,  is  a  mile  and  a  quarter  north  of  the  vil- 
lage of  Patterson  (at  the  Brockville  station  of  the  Philadelphia  and 
Reading  Railroad)  half  a  mile  north  of  the  old  Potts  and  Sillyman 
coal  mines,  a  mile  northwest  of  the  old  Swift  Creek  colliery,  a  mile 
and  a  quarter  west  of  the  Palmer  tunnel  of  the  Kentucky  Bank  col- 
liery, two  miles  west  of  the  village  of  Tuscarora,  three  miles  north 
of  Middleport,  four  miles  southeast  of  New  Boston,  four  miles  and 
a  half  southeast  of  Mahanoy  City,  five  miles  southeast  of  Morea, 
five  miles  and  a  half  west-southwest  of  Tamaqua,  and  eight  miles 
northeast  of  Pottsville. 

The  tract  is  in  the  shape  of  a  cleaver,  with  a  long  handle  towards 
the  northeast,  and  a  broad  blade  on  the  southeast  side  towards  the 
southwest.  The  handle  is  900  yards  long  and  300  yards  wide,  and 
the  blade  averages  about  1200  yards  long  by  600  yards  wide,  nar- 
rower, however,  towards  the  west,  making  the  total  length  about  a 
mile  and  a  quarter.  According  to  a  very  accurate  survey  made  last 
summer  by  Mr.  Howell  T.  Fisher,  the  tract  contains  207  acres  and 
140  perches,  or  207J  acres. 

2.  LAY  OF  THE  LAND. 

The  tract  lies  on  the  southern  edge  of  Broad  Mountain,  about 
half  a  mile  north  of  the  Mine  Hill  ridge  formed  by  the  Mine  Hill 
anticlinal.  Big  Creek  flows  across  the  very  south  westernmost  corner 
of  the  tract,  and  is  a  stream  of  a  dozen  feet  in  width.  Little  Creek, 
only  2  or  3  feet  wide,  crosses  the  middle  of  the  broad  part  of  the 
tract  from  north  to  south,  and  joins  Big  Creek  three-quarters  of  a 
mile  below  the  southern  boundary. 

The  general  trend  of  the  hills  at  the  northern  boundary  is  nearly 
parallel  to  it,  and  they  descend  thence  rather  gently  throughout  most 
of  the  handle-shaped  part  of  the  tract,  but  40  feet  to  a  comparatively 


—  6  — 

level  bench  some  300  yards  wide  at  the  blade-end  of  the  handle,  and 
much  narrower  towards  the  west.  Then,  near  the  middle  of  the 
broad  part  of  the  tract,  the  hills  fall  off  steeply  about  a  hundred  feet, 
with  an  east  and  west  trend,  to  another  broad  bench  that  continues 
to  the  southern  boundary,  with  a  small  parallel  ridge  at  the  west  and 
a  continuous  gentle  slope  downwards  at  the  east. 

The  steep  bluff  through  the  middle  of  the  tract  is  cut  square 
across  by  Little  Creek,  with  a  bold  crag  on  the  eastern  bank,  but 
with  gentler  slopes  on  the  west.  A  broad  gentle  rise  in  the  southern 
bench  separates  that  small  stream  from  Big  Creek,  and  is  in  line  with 
the  main  course  of  Big  Creek  up  stream,  and  seems  like  a  strong 
barrier  that  dammed  back  the  creek  from  its  former  straight  easterly 
course  and  forced  it  to  cut  its  way  southward  across  the  probably 
already  notched  Mine  Hill  anticlinal,  where  the  gap  now  forms  what 
is  called  Moss  Glen,  a  narrow  ravine  encumbered  with  big  blocks  of 
conglomerate. 

A  consideration  of  the  geological  structure  shows  that  the  broad 
rise  in  the  lower  bench  is  really  such  a  barrier,  and  composed  of  the 
same  very  hard  rock  beds  that  appear  in  the  crag  and  hill  east  of 
Little  Creek  near  the  middle  of  the  tract,  and  in  the  hill  south  of 
the  southern  bench  to  the  westward,  and  that  the  two  broad  benches 
with  the  hills  bounding  them  north  and  south  are  occasioned  by  the 
basin-like  form  of  the  underlying  rocks.  The  topography  is  not 
merely  a  key  to  the  geological  structure,  but  of  itself  almost  a  com- 
plete demonstration  of  it  without  the  numerous  additional  corrobo- 
rative observations  that  have  been  made. 

The  land  rises  at  the  northern  boundary  to  about  1400  feet  above 
sea-level,  on  the  northern  bench  to  about  1360  feet,  on  the  southern 
bench  to  about  1250  feet,  and  at  the  lowest  point,  where  Little  Creek 
leaves  the  tract,  to  about  1 1 50  feet. 

The  road  from  Brockville  across  Locust  Valley  to  Mahanoy  City 
enters  the  southern  edge  of  the  tract  100  yards  east  of  Little  Creek 
and  goes  out  near  the  northwest  corner.  The  only  building  on  the 
tract  is  a  small  shanty  for  tools  at  Blew's  slopes,  two  small  slopes  on 
the  Mammoth  coal  bed  at  the  angle  formed  by  the  broad  part  of  the 
tract,  or  blade,  with  the  handle.  An  air-hole  about  60  yards  further 
east  gives  access  to  the  old  abandoned  workings  of  the  Kentucky 
Bank  coal  mine.  On  the  east  bank  of  Little  Creek,  at  60  yards 
northeast  of  the  great  crag  already  mentioned,  there  is  the  mouth  of 
a  trial  drift  driven  about  five  years  ago  for  some  84  yards  on  a  small 
vein  of  coal.  On  the  west  bank  of  Little  Creek,  just  north  of  the 


Mahanoy  City  road,  there  is  a  diamond  drill  hole  that  was  bored 
a  couple  of  years  ago. 

3.  GEOLOGY. 

STRUCTURE. — The  main  feature  of  the  geological  structure  is  a 
deep  basin  running  east  and  west  through  the  southern  part  of  the 
broad  portion  of  the  tract,  sinking  eastward,  just  north  of  the  great 
Mine  Hill  anticlinal.  The  basin  is  followed  on  the  north,  almost 
without  an  intervening  saddle,  by  a  basin  that  is  shallow  at  the  east 
end  of  the  tract,  but  rises  and  grows  narrower  westward,  so  as  to 
become  apparently  little  more  than  a  space  of  very  flat  dips  at  the 
western  end  of  the  tract.  This  shallow  basin  appears  to  have  a  sub- 
ordinate slight  roll  near  the  middle.  The  Mine  Hill  anticlinal 
axis  is  to  the  south  of  the  tract,  and  is  sinking  rapidly  eastward,  and 
has  likewise  on  its  northern  side  a  subordinate  roll  that  perhaps 
becomes  the  principal  saddle  further  east,  near  the  mouth  of  the 
Palmer  tunnel. 

The  dips  on  the  south  side  of  the  main  basin  are  gentle,  some  20° 
or  25°  at  most  at  the  western  edge  of  the  tract,  though  37°  at  the 
eastern,  but  on  the  northern  side,  for  a  short  space,  are  much  steeper, 
up  to  70°,  or  a  little  more.  Thence  northward,  under  the  northern 
bench,  the  dips  are  very  gentle  or  quite  flat ;  then,  northward,  steeper 
again,  say  30°  or  45°. 

The  openings  of  coal  beds  and  the  exposures  of  dips  are  so  numer- 
ous both  on  the  tract  and  adjacent  thereto,  including  several  mines, 
that  the  geological  structure  is  now  worked  out  in  great  detail,  and 
is  thereby  thoroughly  demonstrated,  even  aside  from  the  very  strong 
corroboration  of  the  surface  topography. 

ROCKS. — The  rocks  just  below  the  surface  of  the  tract  belong  to 
the  lower  part  of  the  productive  coal  measures,  together  with  a  little 
of  the  underlying  Pottsville  conglomerate. 

The  highest  beds,  those  in  the  middle  of  the  main  basin  at  the 
eastern  boundary  line,  are  about  75  feet  above  the  middle  of  the 
Orchard  (or  Grier)  coal  bed.  That  bed  has  never  been  opened  on 
the  tract,  though  formerly  worked  at  a  small  mine  a  mile  to  the 
south,  and  in  the  Palmer  tunnel,  where  its  average  thickness  of  good 
coal  was  6  feet  (H.  D.  Rogers's  Final  Report  on  the  Geology  of 
Pennsylvania,  1858,  vol.  ii.,  p.  414). 

From  the  middle  of  the  Orchard  down  to  the  middle  of  the  Prim- 
rose, the  next  lower  coal  bed,  is  a  thickness  here  of  ab\>ut  115  feet, 
the  character  of  which  has  not  been  observed  on  the  tract,  except 


—  8  — 

the  lower  34J  feet  sand-rock,  bored  through  at  the  diamond  drill 
hole  near  the  middle  of  the  tract ;  but  would  appear  from  the  cross- 
section  in  Rogers's  Report,  vol.  ii.,  p.  106,  to  be  chiefly  shaly,  with 
some  sand-rock  layers.  The  Primrose  bed,  so  far  as  known,  on  the 
tract  and  close  to  it,  has  an  average  thickness  there  of  about  18 
inches. 

Below  the  middle  of  the  Primrose  bed  there  is  a  thickness  of 
about  120  feet  down  to  the  middle  of  the  Holmes  (or  Palmer)  coal 
bed.  According  to  the  diamond  drill  boring,  the  whole  thickness 
was  alternating  beds  of  sand-rock  and  conglomerate,  except  some  17 
feet  of  slate  near  the  middle.  The  Holmes  bed  may  be  taken  as 
averaging  18  inches  in  thickness. 

From  the  middle  of  the  Holmes  coal  bed  down  to  the  middle  of 
the  coal  bed  sometimes  called  the  Top  Split  of  the  Mammoth,  there 
is  a  thickness  of  about  188  feet,  only  conglomerate  so  far  as  observed 
on  the  tract  in  the  diamond  drill  hole,  except  a  little  fire  clay  under 
the  upper  coal  and  some  sand -rock  in  the  upper  30  feet  or  so,  and 
practically  the  same  is  seen  on  the  Mahanoy  City  or  Locust  Valley 
road  up  from  Brockville ;  but  Rogers's  report  mentions  two  beds  of 
coal,  the  upper  one  2  feet  thick  and  the  lower  one  4  feet,  in  that 
space  at  the  Palmer  tunnel ;  and  the  upper  one  has  there  only  slate 
above  it,  and  below  it  only  sandstone  down  to  the  lower  one  of  the 
two.  The  upper  of  the  two  coal-beds  seems  to  occur  to  the  south 
of  the  tract  in  the  cross-sections  M  N  and  O  P  ;  and  the  lower  one  in 
M  N  (see  p.  30).  That  report  described  the  rest  of  the  space  down  to  the 
so-called  Top  Split,  or  Seven-Foot  bed,  in  the  Palmer  tunnel,  as  "  hard 
pebbly  rock"  (vol.  ii.,  p.  103),  and  so  it  is  at  the  place  just  men- 
tioned on  the  Mahanoy  City  road,  with  some  pebbles  as  large  as  wal- 
nuts. The  coal  bed  here  sometimes  called  the  Top  Split  of  the 
Mammoth,  may  be  taken  as  averaging  about  3J  feet  in  thickness  on 
the  tract. 

From  the  middle  of  the  so-called  Top  Split  of  the  Mammoth  down 
to  the  middle  of  the  main  Mammoth  bed  is  a  thickness  of  about 
90  feet,  both  at  the  Palmer  Tunnel  and  on  the  tract  and  at  the  old 
mines  to  the  south.  Rogers  gives  the  intervening  rock  beds  as 
"  hard  pebbly  rock  "  (vol.  ii.,  p.  103),  and  so  they  appear  on  the  road 
up  from  Brockville  towards  Locust  Valley  and  Mahanoy  City. 
The  diamond  drill  borer  near  the  middle  of  the  tract  found  them  con- 
glomerate, with  a  little  sandstone  towards  the  bottom.  The  beds 
are  in  great  part  exposed  here  and  there  in  the  hill  eastward  from 
Little  Creek,  and  are  everywhere  conglomerate,  and  for  a  thickness 


— -9  — 

of  30  feet  at  the  crag  already  mentioned  just  east  of  that  creek  are 
very  coarse,  with  pebbles  up  to  3  inches  in  diameter.  The  increase 
in  coarseness  is  only  very  local ;  but  coarse  conglomerate  at  this 
horizon  is  not  unusual  in  the  anthracite  region,  and  has  been  observed 
four  miles  further  west,  near  Silver  creek,  also  on  the  Riehle  tract, 
next  west  of  Morea,  at  the  Otto  colliery,  near  Branchdale,  and  at 
many  other  places  (see  the  paper  on  "  An  Occurrence  of  Coarse 
Conglomerate  above  the  Mammoth  Anthracite  Bed/'  read  before 
the  American  Institute  of  Mining  Engineers  at  the  Reading  meeting, 
October,  1892).  The  average  total  thickness  of  the  main  Mammoth 
coal  bed  on  the  tract  may  be  taken  as  1 1  feet. 

From  the  middle  of  the  Mammoth  coal  bed  down  to  the  middle 
of  the  coal  bed  of  the  old  trial  drift  is  a  variable  thickness.  At 
Blew's  slopes  it  amounts  to  about  50  feet ;  but  at  the  air  hole  of  the 
old  drift  the  two  beds  are  only  10  feet  3  inches  apart.  The  whole 
space  between  the  beds  appears  to  be  filled  with  hard  gray  sand-rock, 
except  half  a  dozen  feet  of  fire-clay  under  the  upper  coal  bed  near 
the  slopes.  The  drift  coal  bed  may  be  taken  as  averaging  possibly 
3  feet  on  the  tract.  It  is  the  same  as  the  Skid  more  bed  of  Morea 
and  New  Boston  and  the  Wharton  bed  of  the  middle  and  northern 
anthracite  fields.  The  name,  Skidmore,  however,  is  sometimes  given 
in  the  southern  field  to  the  next  lower  coal  bed,  if  it  is  at  any  point 
the  thicker  of  the  two. 

From  the  middle  of  the  Drift  coal  bed  down  to  the  middle  of  the 
Ten  Foot  coal  bed  is  a  thickness  of  about  50  feet,  all  apparently 
composed,  between  the  coals,  of  gray  sand-rock.  The  Ten  Foot  bed 
is  10  feet  7  inches  thick  at  the  only  point  where  it  has  been  opened 
on  the  tract. 

From  the  middle  of  the  Ten  Foot  coal  bed  down  to  the  middle  of 
the  Buck  Mountain  coal  bed  is  a  thickness  of  70  feet,  apparently  all 
filled,  except  the  coal,  with  sand-rock.  The  Buck  Mountain  coal 
bed  may  be  taken  on  the  tract  as  averaging  8  feet  in  total  thickness. 

From  the  middle  of  the  Buck  Mountain  coal  bed  down  to  the 
middle  of  the  Spring  coal  bed  is  a  thickness  of  about  35  feet ;  and 
all  between  the  coals  is  apparently  sand-rock,  except  a  foot  or  more 
of  fire-clay  at  the  top.  The  Spring  coal  bed  was  opened  last  sum- 
mer near  the  northwest  corner  of  the  tract,  some  20  yards  north  of 
the  Buck  Mountain  coal  opening  and  was  3  feet  thick.  The  bed 
is  known  at  Morea,  and  is  there  about  2  feet  thick. 

From  the  middle  of  the  Spring  coal  bed  down  to  the  middle  of 
the  Lykens  Valley  coal  bed  is  about  390  feet  at  New  Boston, 


—  10  — 

Morea  and  the  East  Mahanoy  tunnel,  and  the  Boston  Run  tunnel, 
and  not  far  from  that  thickness  near  Tamaqua  (see  State  Geological 
Survey  Atlas,  Southern  Coal  Field,  Pt.  I.,  Cross  Section  Sheet  III., 
Section  12),  and  presumably  about  the  same  on  this  tract;  and  the 
interval  between  the  coals  is  filled  with  conglomerate.  The  Lykens 
Valley  coal  bed  at  New  Boston  is  about  2J  feet  thick.  It  does 
not  crop  out  on  this  tract  and  has  never  been  opened  anywhere  in  the 
immediate  neighborhood,  and  its  thickness  hereabouts  is  quite  un- 
known. There  is  no  workable  coal  known  below  it. 

4.  COAL  BEDS. 

MAMMOTH  COAL  BED. — The  Mammoth  coal  bed  has  been 
slightly  worked  on  the  tract,  and  extensively  so  within  a  short  dis- 
tance outside,  and  has  been  proved  by  several  trial  openings  inside 
as  well  as  by  a  great  number  outside. 

Palmer  Tunnel. — The  Mammoth  coal  bed  was  formerly  worked 
in  the  Kentucky  Bank  mines  from  Palmer  Tunnel,  not  only  east- 
ward, but  westward  "2250  yards"  (Rogers's  Final  Report,  1858, 
vol.  ii.,  p.  413)  ;  that  is,  more  than  a  100  yards  into  the  eastern  edge 
of  the  tract,  a  statement  that  agrees  with  local  tradition.  Accord- 
ing to  that  report  the  bed  there  "averages  20  feet"  (p.  103);  or 
"its  normal  thickness  is  18  feet"  (p.  413);  but  at  850  yards  to 
the  west  the  part  worked,  supposed  to  be  only  one  split,  had  a 
thickness  of  7J  feet.  Mr.  H.  S.  Thompson  in  his  report  on  the  tract, 
cites  the  original  map  of  the  tunnel  made  in  1853  by  Mr.  George 
K.  Smith,  mining  engineer,  and  shows  the  Mammoth  coal  bed  to 
be  20  feet  thick  there,  and  that  "  Mr.  Smith's  map  shows  it  after 
separating  from  the  top  split  to  be  about  9  feet  thick  with  about  8 
feet  9  inches  of  coal  (2  feet  of  it  soft  coal)  at  one  place,  and  7  feet  of 
good  coal  at  another  place." 

Old  Air  Hole. — Near  the  western  end  of  the  Palmer  Tunnel  work- 
ings and  only  60  yards  east  of  the  eastern  boundary  of  the  broad 
part  of  the  tract,  an  air  hole  still  gives  admission  to  the  old  mine ; 
and  it  has  been  entered  by  Mr.  A.  D.  W.  Smith  and  many  others 
in  the  past  season,  as  well  as  in  former  years.  They  say  that  at  one 
point  there  the  bed  is  17  or  18  feet  thick,  but  with  an  average  ap- 
parently of  about  12  feet  total  thickness.  He  has  found  in  his 
recent  elaborate  researches  for  the  State  Coal  Waste  Commission  that 
235  sections  of  various  coal  beds  in  the  southern  anthracite  field 
give  an  average  of  72  per  cent,  of  coal  in  the  total  thickness ;  and  that 
1144  such  sections  in  the  middle  anthracite  field  give  an  average  of 


77  per  cent,  of  coal.  A  total  thickness  of  12  feet  would  therefore 
have  probably  9  feet  of  coal.  The  sections  of  the  Mammoth  mea- 
sured in  the  trial  pits  of  the  past  season  in  the  tract  itself  and  close 


MAMMOTH     BED 


NEAR   DRIFT 


SOUTHWESTERN 


SCALE 

10  FEET  TO  AN  INCH 


[i-ri:i:>:-i- 

i   :1^! 


SAND 
ROCK 


,3  SLATE 


DRIKTEfD. 


5,,  FIRECLAY 


to  it  give  a  slightly  larger  average  percentage  of  coal  in  the  total 
thickness. 

Slew's  Slopes. — Just  inside  the  eastern  boundary  of  the  broad  part 
of  the  tracts  there  are  two  small  slopes,  within  a  few  yards  of  each 


—  12  — 

other,  sunk  in  1886  or  1887,  and  worked  by  Mr.  William  Blew. 
The  older,  eastern  one  of  the  two  is  reported  by  Mr.  H.  S.  Thomp- 
son in  November,  1886,  to  be  110  feet  deep,  but  for  the  lower  40 
feet  already  inaccessible,  partially  fallen  closed  and  full  of  water. 
He  quotes  the  thickness  of  the  bed  at  the  bottom  of  that  slope  as 
"  from  9  to  10  feet,"  and  it  was  also  reported  to  us  as  10  feet ;  and 
from  his  investigations  hereabouts  he  takes  it  at  10  feet.  At  about 
40  feet  from  the  top  of  the  slope,  however,  the  bed  measures  about 
5  feet  thick,  all  coal.  A  total  thickness  of  10  feet  would  indicate  a 
thickness  probably  of  7J  feet  of  coal.  The  roof  here  is  hard  sand- 
rock  with  a  few  inches  of  black  slate  under  it;  and  the  floor  is  dark- 
gray  fire-clay  about  5  feet,  overlying  at  least  6  feet  of  sand-rock 
growing  harder  downwards,  and  at  that  depth  having  pea  pebbles. 

Near  Old  Drift. — At  1100  feet  west  of  Blew's  slopes  and  near  the 
air-hole  of  the  old  drift,  the  Mammoth  bed  was  opened  last  Octo- 
ber on  its  outcrop,  and  the  following  section  was  measured,  from 
above  downward  : 

Ft.  Ins. 
Bluish-gray  fine  hard  sand-rock,  exposed  in  the  shaft,  8  or 

9  feet,  say, 8  „  6 

Coaly  clay, .  0  „  OJ 

COAL,  rather  soft  at  present. 1  „  2 

COAL,  bony, .         .  0  „  4 

COAL,  rather  soft,            0  „  11 

COAL,  firm  and  good, 7  „  4 

Black  carbonaceous  slate,        .         .         .         .         .         .         .  2  „  1 

COAL,  very  hard,  good, 3  ,,  4    . 

Black  slate, 0  „  2 

COAL,  soft, 2  „  6 

Dark -gray  shaly  sand-rock,              9  „  6 

Coaly  shale,  "  clod," 0  „  9 

COAL,  DRIFT-BED,  1  foot  8  inches  to  2  feet  6  inches,  but 

just  here,  2  feet  to  2  feet  5  inches,  say,              .         .         .  2  „  2? 

Fire-clay,  about 5  „  0 

43  „       9| 

The  lower  coal  is  in  the  old  drift,  into  which  they  dug  from  the 
bottom  of  the  Mammoth,  only  7  feet.  It  is  seen,  then,  that  the 
Mammoth  bed  here  is  17  feet  10  inches  thick,  with  15  feet  7  inches 
of  coal.  The  softer  portions  of  the  coal  will  perhaps  be  firm  at  a 
better  distance  from  the  outcrop.  The  shaft  is  about  28  feet  deep 
to  the  outcrop  of  the  bottom  of  the  bed,  and  is  driven  thence  hori- 
zontally across  the  bed.  The  dip  near  the  top  of  the  bed  is  37° 
southerly. 


—  13  — 

Log  Road.  —  At  350  yards  further  west,  on  the  log  road,  the 
Mammoth  bed  was  opened  in  December,  1892,  by  a  trial  shaft  on 
its  outcrop;  and  the  following  section  was  measured,  from  above 
downward  : 

Ft.      Ins. 

Gray  sand  -rock  exposed  in  the  shaft,  about,  .         .         .  2  „     0 

COAL,  rather  soft  (so  near  the  outcrop),          .         .         .         .  0  „    8£ 

Black  slate  rather  decomposed,       .         .         .         .         .         .  2  ,,     0 

COAL,  ...........  0  „    1 

Black  slate,    .........         .  0  „     2 

COAL,     ...........  0  „    1 

Black  slate,     ..........  0  „  1  1 

COAL,      ...........  2  „    6 

COAL,  softer,  ..........  0  „  10 

COAL,  harder,          .        .        .         .....         .  0  ,,    7 

COAL,  softer,    .....        .....  0  „    4 

Black  slaty  fire-clay,       .......         .  2  „     0 

Gray,  hard  sand-rock,     .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .  3  „     6 

15  „     8} 

The  Mammoth  bed  has  here,  then,  5  feet  1  J  inches  of  coal  in  a 
total  thickness  of  8  feet  2J  inches.  The  softer  parts  are  again 
affected  by  nearness  to  the  outcrop.  The  shaft  is  wholly  vertical, 
and  36  feet  deep  to  the  bottom  of  the  bed.  The  dip  at  the  top  of 
the  bed  is  70°  and  at  the  bottom  55°,  both  southerly.  The  diver- 
gence shows  that  it  happens  to  be  just  at  the  point  of  a  small  local 
squeeze. 

West  End  of  Tract.  —  At  325  yards  still  further  west  and  90  yards 
short  of  the  west  boundary,  the  same  bed  was  opened  last  July,  and 
the  following  section  was  measured,  from  above  downward  : 

Ft.  Ins. 

Light-gray  sand-rock,     .         .         ......  5  ,,  6 

White  fire-clay,       .........  1  „  6 

Black  slate,     ..........  0  „  4 

COAL,  bony,     .        .        .         .....         .        .  0  ,,  3 

COAL,  soft,      ..........  0  .,  8£ 

Black  slate,     ..........  0  „  7£ 

COAL,  bony,    ..........  0  ,,  1 

Black  slate,     ........         .         .  0  „  7 

COAL,  good,    .......        .        .        .  0,,  7 

Black  slate,     .        .        ........  0  „  3 

COAL,  good,     ..........  0  „  8 

Black  slate,     ..........  0  „  4 

COAL,  4  feet  5  inches  to  5  feet,  say,         .....  4  „  8£ 

Black  slate,  with  some  coal  specks,  growing  hard  below,       .  5  „  9 


The  lower  main  bench  of  coal  has  at  one  point  an  inch  of  bony 


—  14  — 

coal  at  10  inches  above  the  bottom.  It  is  seen,  then,  that  the  Mam- 
moth bed  here  has  from  6  feet  8J  inches  to  7  feet  3J  inches,  or  say 
a  mean  of  7  feet  of  coal,  within  a  total  thickness  of  9  feet  1  inch. 
The  coal  is  mostly  very  firm  and  good;  as  the  distance  from  the 
very  decomposed  outcrop  is  somewhat  better  than  in  the  more  eastern 
trial  shafts  and  the  pit  is  in  a  drier  situation.  The  depth  here  is  35 
feet ;  and  the  surface  wash  was  only  about  20  feet  deep.  The  dip 
at  the  bottom  is  60°  southerly. 

Southwest. — At  250  yards  easterly  from  the  southwest  corner  of 
the  tract  and  60  yards  south  of  the  southern  boundary  line,  the 
Mammoth  bed  was  opened  the  past  season  and  the  following  section 
measured,  from  above  downwards  : 

Ft.  Ins. 

White,  fine  sand-rock,  about, 4  „  6 

Fire-clay,  about, 2  „  6 

Black  slate,  about, 1  „  0 

Fire-clay,  about, 2  „  6 

COAL,,  9  inches  to  1  foot  3  inches,  say, 1  „  0 

Black  slate, 2  "  0 

COAL,  rather  soft, 0  „  11 

Black  slate, 1  „  6 

COAL,  hard,  3  „    4 

Fire-clay, 9  „  0 


28,,    3 

The  Mammoth  coal-bed  then,  has  here  a  total  thickness  of  8  feet 
6  inches  or  nine  feet,  say  8  feet  9  inches,  with  5  feet  or  5  feet  6 
inches,  say  5  feet  3  inches  of  coal.  The  trial  pit  is  a  vertical  shaft 
11  feet  deep  prolonged  on  the  coal  bed  into  a  slope  about  38  feet 
long,  with  some  digging  into  the  roof  at  the  face.  The  dip  is  20° 
northerly. 

The  opening  is  on  the  south  side  of  the  basin,  and  as  the  identity 
of  the  bed  is  clear  from  its  very  section,  as  well  as  from  the  position 
of  the  two  other  well-identified  beds  opened  above  it  near  by,  and 
from  its  own  position  on  its  long  southern  outcrop,  fixed  here  and 
there  by  numerous  trial  pits  and  several  extensive  mines,  it  is  one 
link  in  the  irrefragable  chain  of  evidence  that  the  rocks  of  the  main 
southern  body  of  the  tract  do  lie  simply  in  the  form  of  a  basin.  The 
outcrop  continues  hence  eastward  around  the  descending  Mine  Hill 
anticlinal,  and  is  found  on  the  Brockville  and  Mahanoy  City  road 
near  the  springs,  and  further  to  the  southeast  was  formerly  opened 
near  the  top  of  the  axis  at  several  trial  shafts,  and  still  further  south- 
ward and  westward  was  formerly  opened  with  drifts  and  slopes  and 


—  15  — 

extensively  mined,  as  shown  on  the  map.  Westward  of  the  two  last- 
described  openings,  the  same  Mammoth  bed  was  formerly  opened  by 
three  trial  pits  on  the  south  side  of  the  basin  and  by  one  on  the  north 
side  near  Big  Creek,  as  shown  on  the  map  ;  and  there  were  also  two 
other  openings  of  it  farther  up  the  creek,  400  yards  beyond  the 
western  limit  of  the  map  and  near  the  "  spoon  of  the  basin  "  of  that 
coal-bed. 

Average  Thickness.  —  From  the  figures  already  given  some  idea  of 
the  average  thickness  of  the  bed  on  the  tract  may  be  obtained,  as  may 
be  seen  by  the  following  table  : 

Opening.  Total.  Coal. 

ft.     in.  ft.     in. 


Near  the  old  drift, 
On  the  log  road,  .... 
Near  western  edge  of  tract, 

.     17  ,,10 

.        .      8,.    2* 

•        •      9  „  1 
8  „  9 

15  „  7 
5,,  1 
7,,  0 
5  „  3 

Sum,  to  be  divided  by  four,  . 
Average, 

.      43  „  10£ 
10  „  lit 

32  ,,11 

8  „  21 

or  say,  eight  feet  and  a  quarter  of  coal  in  a  total  thickness  of  eleven 
feet. 

If  the  reported  and  estimated  thickness  of  the  bed  at  Blew's  slopes 
and  in  the  adjacent  portion  of  the  Kentucky  Bank  mine  be  counted, 
as  given  above,  the  result  is  identical  : 

Opening.  Total.  Coal. 

ft.       in.  ft.   in. 

Near  west  end  of  Kentucky  Bank  mine,     .      12  „    0  9  ,,  0 

Slew's  Slope  bottom,  .        .        .        .      10  „    0  7  „  6 


Sum,  to  be  divided  by  two,  .        .        .     22  „    0  16  ,,  6 

Average, 11  „    0  8  „  3 

These  results  may  then  probably  be  taken  pretty  safely  as  not  very 
far  from  correct,  but  for  greater  safety,  as  well  as  simplicity,  we  may, 
in  estimating  the  quantity  of  coal,  take  the  thickness  as  only  8  feet. 

Outcrops. — The  outcrop  of  the  Mammoth  bed  has  been  carefully 
drawn  on  the  map  both  within  and  without  the  tract,  taking  account 
of  the  dips,  the  strikes,  the  height  of  the  surface  of  the  ground  and 
the  position  of  the  bed  in  numerous  cross  sections  (not  all  of  them 
printed),  according  to  the  new  and  old  trial  pits  and  mine  workings. 
Towards  the  northeast,  however,  along  the  workings  of  the  Ken- 
tucky Bank  mine,  the  old  crop-falls  have  been  taken  as  the  main 
guide  to  the  places  of  outcrop.  The  outcrop  has  everywhere  been 


—  16  — 

marked  as  if  20  feet  below  the  surface  of  the  ground,  to  allow  for  the 
surface  wash  that  is  unusually  deep  over  most  of  the  tract  and  often 
nearly  or  quite  that  depth.  In  any  case,  the  coal  itself  is  more  or 
less  decomposed  almost  everywhere  to  fully  that 'depth,  sometimes 
deeper,  especially  where  the  dip  is  steep  and  the  circulation  of  water 
abundant. 

Quantity. — Measuring  then  the  portion  of  the  tract  underlain  by 
the  Mammoth  bed,  we  find  it  to  be  95  acres.  Taking  account  of 
the  greater  extent  of  the  bed  itself  by  reason  of  its  basin  shape,  we 
find  there  are  126  acres  of  the  bed.  Reckoning  1976.5  tons  of  coal 
to  the  acre  for  every  foot  of  thickness,  according  to  the  average  spe- 
cific gravity  of  Panther  Creek  coals,  our  nearest  investigated  neigh- 
bors, as  given  (more  precisely  1976.583  tons)  in  Report  A  A,  1883, 
p.  136,  of  the  State  Geological  Survey,  we  have  for  the  number  of 
tons  of  coal  in  the  Mammoth  bed,  within  the  tract,  1,990,000  tons. 
Of  that  amount,  830,000  tons  are  above  the  level  of  1000  feet  above 
the  sea :  that  is,  about  the  level  of  the  main  gangway  of  the  Ken- 
tucky Bank  mine  at  the  eastern  edge  of  the  tract,  and  a  level  easily 
accessible  by  tunnels  from  the  south  or  southeast.  The  position  of 
the  middle  of  the  bed  at  different  levels  100  feet  apart,  as  required 
by  the  numerous  cross  sections  drawn,  is  marked  on  the  map,  and 
clearly  shows  the  basin  shape  of  the  bed.  The  greatest  depth  of  the 
bed  below  the  surface  of  the  ground,  anywhere  in  the  tract,  is  at  the 
eastern  edge  of  the  tract,  and  appears  to  be  less  than  700  feet. 

TEN-FOOT  COAL  BED.— Until  last  October  the  Ten-Foot  bed 
had  not  been  opened  anywhere  on  the  tract.  One  trial  opening  on 
it  was  then  made,  and  the  place  of  its  outcrop  has  lately  been  proved 
at  another  place.  The  bed  has  been  formerly  opened  at  several 
places,  more  or  less  distant,  outside  the  tract,  but  is  no  longer  acces- 
sible at  any  of  them. 

Near  Blew's  Slopes. — The  only  opening  of  the  Ten-Foot  bed  on 
the  tract  is  a  trial  shaft  dug  last  October  behind  the  shanty  and  70 
yards  north  of  Blew's  slopes,  with  the  following  section  from  above 
downwards : 


Ft.   Ins. 

Sand-rock,       

.     17       0 

COAL  dirt,  rotten  coal,    . 

.        .        .        .     0  , 

6 

COAL,       

.     6  , 

7 

Black  slate,      

.      0  , 

1* 

COAL,       .        .        .        .  '      . 

.     3  , 

4* 

.        .        .      0  , 

3 

27  „  10 

—  17  — 

The  upper  6  inches  of  rotten  -coal  may  prove  to  be  coal  that  is 
merely  affected  by  its  nearness  to  the  outcrop,  and  at  a  greater  depth 
may  be  of  passable  quality.  Leaving  it  out  of  account  for  the  pres- 
ent, however,  we  have  9  feet  11  \  inches  of  coal  in  a  total  thickness 
of  10  feet  1  inch.  The  dip  here  is  30°  southerly.  The  coal  is  much 
affected  by  the  nearness  of  the  outcrop,  but  appears  to  be  in  charac- 
ter intermediate  between  the  Mammoth  and  the  Buck  Mountain 
coals.  At  36  feet  to  the  north  the  wholly-decomposed  outcrop  of 
the  bed  was  found  in  a  trial  shaft,  with  a  thickness  of  5J  feet  of 
black  dirt,  at  5J  feet  below  the  surface  of  the  ground. 

On  the  log  road,  off  from  the  Mahanoy  City  road,  in  the  western 
part  of  the  tract,  the  outcrop  of  the  bed  was  bored  into  in  the  surface 
wash  a  few  days  ago,  as  a  test  of  the  map,  and  found  exactly  as 
already  laid  down.  Six  feet  of  coal  dirt  were  found,  much  as  at  the 
trial  shaft  just  mentioned. 

Other  Openings — The  same  bed  occurs  at  the  Newkirk  colliery, 
4J  miles  to  the  east,  and  has  there  a  thickness  of  10  feet  1  inch  in 
the  water-level  tunnel  and  4  feet  1  inch  in  a  lower-lift  tunnel.  (See 
the  State  Geol.  Survey's  Southern  Coal  Field  Atlas,  Part  IV.,  Sheet 
IV.,  Columnar  Sections  5  and  6.)  The  bed  is  called  there  the  Bot- 
tom Split  of  the  Mammoth. 

Two  miles  west  of  the  tract,  and  400  yards  east  of  Silver  Creek 
dam,  there  are  a  couple  of  old  openings  on  the  same  bed  apparently. 
The  two  holes  are  200  yards  apart  north  and  south,  one  on  either 
side  of  the  basin.  The  northern  one  had,  acccording  to  the  notes  of 
Mr.  P.  W.  Sheafer,  12  feet  of  coal  with  6  inches  of  bony  at  2  feet 
9  inches  above  the  bottom ;  consequently  with  a  section  much  re- 
sembling that  of  the  opening  on  the  tract.  The  southern  of  the 
two  holes  had  a  total  thickness  of  9  feet  3  inches,  with  8  feet  8 
inches  of  coal. 

South  of  the  tract,  and  not  far  from  the  Silly  man  and  Potts 
mines,  the  Ten-Foot  bed  has  been  opened  at  several  trial  shafts,  as 
shown  on  the  map  and  in  the  cross-sections;  but  they  are  all  long 
since  fallen  shut,  and  the  thickness  of  the  bed  is  not  known.  The 
place  of  the  bed  there,  however,  corresponds  closely  with  its  place 
as  found  on  the  tract,  and  therefore  corroborates  well  the  geology  of 
the  map. 

Average  Thickness. — It  appears,  then,  that  the  thickness  found  in 
the  only  opening  of  the  bed  on  the  tract,  and  the  only  one  recorded 
within  a  couple  of  miles,  is  not  unlike  the  nearest  ones  known  out- 
side of  that  distance.  It  is,  therefore,  perhaps  not  unsafe  to  take  it 

2 


—  18  — 


as  indicating  the  thickness  of  the  bed  throughout  the  tract,  and  to 
reckon  the  average  thickness  there  at  10  feet  of  coal,  within  a  total 
thickness  of  10J  feet. 


TEN  FOOT  BED 


TEN  FOOT  BED 


AND 


BUCK  MTN.  BED 


WESTERN 


ROAD  FORKS 
COAL 


JUST    OUTSIDE 


3.6  COAL 


ROCK 


SCALE 

10  FEET  TO  AN  INCH 


Quantity. — The  outcrop  through  the  tract  was  drawn,  and  the 
area  underlain  by  the  bed  was  found  to  be  115  acres.  Allowing  for 
the  basin  shape,  the  area  of  the  bed  itself  was  found  to  be  143J 
acres.  Reckoning  a  thickness  of  10  feet  and  the  same  specific 
gravity  as  before,  the  quantity  of  coal  was  found  to  be  2,840,000 
tons.  Of  that,  1,400,000  tons  are  above  the  level  of  1000  feet  above 


—  19  — 

the  sea.  That  level  was  drawn  on  the  manuscript  map  in  order  to 
measure  the  area,  but  to  avoid  too  great  complication  is  not  marked 
on  the  printed  one. 

BUCK  MOUNTAIN  COAL  BED. — The  Buck  Mountain  coal  bed  has 
never  been  worked  on  the  tract  nor  anywhere  within  at  least  nearly 
2  miles  of  it,  but  a  number  of  old  and  now  inaccessible  trial  pits 
have  been  sunk  upon  it  east  of  the  tract  and  to  the  south  beyond 
the  Mine  Hill  anticlinal,  and  the  past  season  three  trial  openings  of 
it  have  been  made  on  the  tract  itself. 

Just  Outside  East  End  of  Tract. — A  dozen  yards  east  of  the  north- 
eastern end  of  the  tract  there  is  an  old  opening  on  the  Buck  Moun- 
tain coal  bed,  with  a  recorded  thickness  of  9J  feet  of  coal. 

Northeast  Hole. — Sixty  yards  to  the  southwest  of  that,  and  inside 
of  the  northeast  end  of  the  tract,  an  old  hole  on  the  outcrop  of  the 
Buck  Mountain  bed  was  reopened  the  past  season,  and  the  fol- 
lowing section  was  measured  from  above  downward  : 

Ft.  Ins. 
Strong  sand-rock  roof.  « 

Dark  gray  shale,  about 2  „  0 

COAL,  rotten, 2  „  9 

Black  slate,  4£  feet  to  0  inches,  say,         .         .         .         .         .  0  „  2 

COAL,  rotten, 3  „  8 

8  „  7 

The  bed  appears,  then,  to  have  here  a  total  thickness  of  6  feet  7 
inches,  with  6  feet  5  inches  of  coal.  The  coal  is  mostly  decomposed 
from  nearness  to  the  outcrop,  though  small  pieces  showed  it  to  be  of 
good  quality;  but  the  hole  was  a  wet  one  and  difficult  to  supply 
with  air,  and  was  not  driven  deeper.  The  abundant  circulation  of 
the  water  has  no  doubt  aided  in  the  decomposition  of  the  coal.  The 
hole  was  a  shaft  12  feet  6  inches  deep,  continued  by  a  slope  25  feet 
long  on  the  coal  bed.  The  dip  was  43°  southeast. 

Road  Forks. — At  the  forks  of  an  old  road,  about  300  yards  fur- 
ther west,  another  opening  of  the  Buck  Mountain  coal  bed  was  made 
the  past  season,  and  the  following  section  measured  from  above 
downward : 

Ft.    Ins. 
COAL,  2  feet  8  inches  to  3  feet  10  inches,  say,       ...      3 


Gray  fire  clay, 5 

Coaly  shale,  "clod,"  6  inches  to  2  inches,  say,  0 

COAL  dirt,  rotten  coal, .1 

Slate,  decomposed, 0 

COAL  dirt,  rotten  coal, 1 

Fire  clay,  exposed  about        .         .         .         .         .         .         .3 


3 

4 

10 

10 
0 
6 


—  20  — 

This  was  also  a  very  wet  hole,  and  the  coal,  particularly  in  the 
lower  part,  has  been  much  decomposed  by  the  circulation  of  the 
water.  The  coal  of  the  upper  bench  was  of  good  quality,  with  much 
of  the  birdseye  texture  common  in  the  bed.  The  total  thickness  of 
the  bed  is  apparently  11  feet  11  inches  to  13  feet  1  inch,  or,  in  the 
mean,  12  feet  6  inches,  with  coal  5  feet  6  inches  to  6  feet  8  inches, 
or  say  6  feet  and  1  inch.  The  hole  was  a  shaft  about  23  feet  deep, 
continued  by  a  slope  23  feet  long  on  the  lower  coal  benches,  with 
one  25  feet  long  on  the  upper  bench.  The  dip  was  35°  southerly 
in  the  upper  bench  and  53°  southerly  in  the  lower,  with  a  mean  of 
44° — nearly  the  same  as  at  the  eastern  hole. 

Western  Hole. — At  260  yards  easterly  from  the  northwest  corner  of 
the  tract,  the  Buck  Mountain  coal  bed  was  opened  last  summer,  and 
the  following  section  was  measured  from  above  downward : 

Ft.  Ins. 

Gray  sand-rock,    .         . 6  „     0 

Blackish  shale,  about 1  „     2 

COAL,  still  rather  soft,  .        .        .  » 4  „  2 

Fire  clay,  about 0  „     6 

Hard  rock,  bored, 12  „    0 

23  „  10 

The  bed  here  is,  then,  4  feet  2  inches  thick  in  a  single  bench, 
though  it  is  possible  that  another  coal  bed,  some  feet  higher  up,  ap- 
parently opened  formerly  in  two  holes  100  and  170  yards  to  the 
east,  but  now  inaccessible,  might  be  regarded  as  an  upper  split  of 
the  Buck  Mountain  bed.  The  coal  of  the  present  hole  is  of  good 
quality,  though  affected  and  softened  by  atmospheric  influences. 
The  hole  is  about  35  feet  deep,  the  lower  15,  or  so,  sloping  with  the 
coal  bed.  The  dip  is  66°  southerly. 

Crop  Boring. — On  the  14th  of  January,  1893,  after  the  map  was 
photo-lithographed,  the  black  coal  dirt  of  the  outcrop  was  bored 
through  in  the  surface  wash  near  the  point  where  the  cross-section 
line  A  B,  of  the  map,  crosses  the  outcrop  of  the  Buck  Mountain 
bed,  about  half  a  mile  east  of  the  western  trial  shaft  and  about  a 
third  of  a  mile  west  of  the  one  at  the  road  forks,  and  the  essential 
accuracy  of  the  outcrop  as  laid  down  was  proved.  The  borings 
appear  to  show  that  the  bed  is  there  in  two  benches  some  14  feet 
apart  horizontally,  confirming  the  conclusion  already  arrived  at  that 
there  is  an  upper  bench  just  south  of  the  western  trial  shaft.  The 
black  coal  dirt  of  the  northern,  or  geologically  lower,  boring  was 
found  2  feet  thick  at  18  feet  below  the  surface,  and  that  of  the 


—  21  — 

southern,  or  geologically  upper  one,  6  feet  thick ;  but  the  real  thick- 
ness of  the  two  benches  cannot  be  known  without  actual  digging, 
and  perhaps  even  their  relative  thickness  is  not  indicated  by  those 
numbers.  The  northern  boring  was  inside  the  narrow  markings  of 
the  outcrop  on  the  map,  perhaps  slightly  south  of  its  centre  line ; 
the  southern  one  was  close  outside  the  southern  edge  of  the  same 
marking.  The  real  outcrop  of  the  lower  bench  at  the  boring  may 
be  a  few  feet  further  north  and  thicker  there,  and  the  true  position 
of  the  bench  in  place,  below  the  wash,  may  be  not  only,  as  already 
appears,  within  a  very  few  feet  or  inches  of  the  point  indicated  by 
the  map,  but  exactly  there.  Boring  here  was  undertaken,  like  the 
Ten-Foot  crop  boring  on  the  log  road,  as  a  severe  test  of  the  map  at 
a  somewhat  difficult  point,  but  was  delayed  by  rough  weather.  The 
result  shows  great  regularity  in  the  coal  measures  hereabouts. 

South  of  the  Tract. — The  Buck  Mountain  coal  bed  was  formerly 
opened  at  a  number  of  holes  on  the  south  side  of  the  Mine  Hill  an- 
ticlinal, not  far  from  Sillyman's  slope ;  but  none  of  them  are  now 
accessible,  and  there  is  no  record  of  their  sections.  Their  place, 
however,  as  shown  in  our  map  and  cross-sections,  fully  agrees  with 
the  positions  of  the  beds  on  the  tract,  and  confirms  our  geological 
•interpretation  of  the  facts  observed. 

Neighboring  Mines. — The  State  Geological  Survey's  Southern 
Coal  Field  Columnar  Section  Sheet  IV.  gives  the  thickness  of  the 
Buck  Mountain  coal  bed  at  several  neighboring  mines  as  follows: — 
At  Buckville,  3  miles  to  the  northeast,  in  two  splits,  8  feet  10 
inches  above  and  6  feet  3  inches  below,  separated  by  15  feet  (slate  3 
feet  9  inches ;  sand-rock,  6  feet  3  inches  and  slate  5  feet),  making  15 
feet  1  inch  in  all  of  the  two  splits.  At  Newkirk,4J  miles  to  the  north- 
east of  the  tract,  17  feet  in  the  water-level  tunnel,  and  12  feet  3  inches 
in  another.  In  the  Northdale  tunnel  of  the  Kaska  William  colliery, 
2J  miles  to  the  southwest  of  the  tract,  6  feet  4  inches ;  besides  another 
split,  21  feet  6  inches  (of  hard  sandstone)  higher  up,  3  feet  1  inch 
thick,  shelly  coal ;  and  another,  12  feet  8  inches  (of  slate)  still 
higher,  6  feet  5  inches,  coal  dirt  and  slate.  Moreover,  in  Sharp 
Mountain,  where  the  identity  of  beds  is  less  certain  : — At  Gorman's 
colliery  water-level  tunnel,  less  than  2  miles  southeast  of  the  tract, 
10  feet  10  inches.  At  Bell's  tunnel,  over  2  miles  southeast  of  the 
tract,  2  feet  6  inches — perhaps  more  doubtful  in.  identity  than  the 
others.  At  Reevesdale,  3f  miles  east  of  the  tract,  11  feet  11  inches. 
The  bed  is  generally,  in  the  whole  region,  a  very  important  one  in 
thickness  as  well  as  in  quality. 


—  22  — 


Average  Thickness. — Taking  the  thickness  of  the  Buck  Mountain 
coal  bed,  as  given  above  at  only  the  four  openings  in  the  northern 
part  of  the  tract  and  just  outside,  and  leaving  out  of  account  the 
recent  very  encouraging  crop-boring,  we  have  the  following  table, 
with  an  alternative  column  for  the  extreme  supposition  that  the  re- 
corded 9  feet  6  inches  may  have  been  intended  to  mean  the  total 
thickness  of  the  bed,  and  that  the  coal,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Mam- 
moth, may  be  only  three-quarters  as  much  : 


OPENING. 


Total,  in  feet 
and  inches. 


Coal,  in  feet 
and  inches. 


Or  Coal,  in  ft. 
and  inches. 


Just  Outside 
Northeast .... 
Koad  Forks . 
Western... 


Sum  to  be  divided  by  four. 
Average 


9,,  6 

6,,7 

12  ,,6 

4,,2 

32  ,,9 
8,,  2* 


9,,6 
6,,5 
6,,1 
4,,  2 


26  ,,2 


6,,  5 
6,,1 
4,,  2 


23,, 
5,, 


Taking  the  thickness  as  given  above  for  the  nearest  neighboring 
mines,  and  counting  in  even  those  of  more  doubtful  identity  and 
least  thickness,  we  have : 

Mines.  Ft.      Ins. 

Buckville,          .        . 15  „     1 

Newkirk, 17  „     0 

Newkirk, 12  „     3 

Northdale, 15  „  10 

Keevesdale, 11  „  11 

Gorman's, 10  „  10 

Bell's  tunnel, 2  „     6 

Sum  to  be  divided  by  7, 85  „     5 

Average, 12  „     2J 

Leaving  out  the  three  somewhat  doubtful  Sharp  Mountain  beds, 
we  have : 

Mines.  Ft.       Ins, 

Buckville,         . .-  15  „     1 

Newkirk, 17  „     0 

Newkirk,  . ,        .        .  12  „     3 

Northdale  tunnel, 15  „  10 

Sum  to  be  divided  by  4, 60  „     2 

Average, '    .         .  15  ,,     0£ 


—  23  — 

It  seems  then,  that,  although  it  is  hardly  possible,  that  the  four 
holes  on  the  northern  outcrop  of  the  bed,  in  the  tract  and  close  to  it, 
with  their  comparatively  small  thickness,  give  a  fair  average  for  the 
wide  extent  southward  of  this  great  bed  through  the  tract,  it  would 
be,  at  any  rate,  safe  to  count  on  6  feet  in  thickness  as  the  average  for 
the  whole  area. 

Quantity. — The  outcrop  of  the  bed  has  been  drawn,  as  in  the  case 
of  the  other  beds,  and  the  portion  of  the  tract  underlain  by  the 
bed  has  been  measured,  and  found  to  be  148  acres.  Allowing  for 
the  basin-shape,  the  area  of  the  bed  itself  is  found  to  be  182J  acres. 
Taking  the  average  thickness  at  6  feet,  and  the  specific  gravity  the 
same  as  given  above  for  the  other  beds,  the  coal  is  seen  to  amount 
to  2,170,000  tons;  of  that  amount  850,000  tons  are  above  the  level 
of  1000  feet  above  the  sea.  That  level,  though  not  on  the  printed 
map,  was  drawn  on  the  manuscript  for  purposes  of  measurement. 

The  lowest  point  on  the  bed  in  the  tract  is  at  the  eastern  boundary, 
and  is  about  850  feet  from  the  surface. 

OTHER  COAL,  BEDS. — The  other  coal  beds  are  in  part  workable, 
and  in  part  very  useful  in  studying  out  the  geology  of  the  tract. 

Orchard  Coal  Bed. — The  Orchard  (or  Grier)  coal  bed  is  re- 
ported by  Rogers  (vol.  ii.,  p.  414),  to  have  at  the  Palmer  tunnel 
an  average  thickness  of  6  feet  of  good  coal ;  and  it  was  formerly 
worked  also  at  the  Swift  Creek  mines,  and  half  a  mile  south  of  the 
tract.  It  has  never  been  opened  on  the  tract  itself,  but  would 
seem  to  exist  there,  in  the  middle  of  the  basin,  next  to  the  eastern 
boundary.  Its  area,  however,  would  appear  to  be  only  4  acres 
of  the  tract  and  5  acres  of  bed  surface ;  and  consequently  it  would 
amount  only  to  about  60,000  tons. 

Primrose  Coal  -Bee?.— The  Primrose  coal  bed  is  an  important 
bed  at  the  Palmer  Tunnel,  and  Rogers  (p.  414)  says  it  has  "from 
8  to  16  feet  of  coarse  bird's-eye  coal."  It  has,  however,  the  past 
season,  been  opened  on  its  outcrop  a  dozen  yards  outside  the 
eastern  boundary  of  the  tract  and  found  to  have  there  only  a  thick- 
ness of  15  inches,  with  a  dip  of  64°  southerly.  It  is  also  clearly 
the  upper  bed  in  the  old  diamond  drill  hole  near  Little  Creek,  on 
the  tract,  and  was  found  there  to  have  a  thickness  of  only  about  21 J 
inches.  Though  it  was  formerly  mined  at  the  Swift  Creek  mines 
and  half  a  mile  south  of  the  tract,  and  though  it  may  possibly  be  of 
workable  thickness  towards  its  southern  outcrop  on  the  tract,  it 
would  nevertheless  not  be  safe  to  count  upon  it  as  a  workable  bed 
here.  It  is  useful,  however,  as  a  guide  to  the  geology  of  the  tract, 


—  24  — 

and  a  confirmation  of  the  explanation  given  by  our  map  and  sec- 
tions ;  it  was  formerly  opened  by  trial  pits  at  several  points  to  the 
southwest  near  the  Potts  and  Sillyman  mines,  and  at  every  place 
inside  and  outside  of  the  tract,  agrees  perfectly  in  position  with  its 
place  in  the  Palmer  Tunnel  section. 

Holmes  Coal  Bed. — The  Holmes  (or  Palmer)  coal  bed  was  for- 
merly worked  at  the  Palmer  Tunnel,  and  Rogers  (p.  414)  says  it 
"  averages  ten  feet  of  good  coal  "  there  ;  but  at  some  630  yards  to  the 
west  it  could  not  be  traced  further,  having  no  doubt  grown  thin. 
On  the  tract,  however,  it  has  been  opened  the  past  season  on  the 
outcrop  at  the  foot  of  the  hill  300  yards  southwest  of  Blew's  slopes, 
and  found  to  have  only  19  inches  of  coal  with  about  4  feet  of  black 
slate  above  and  as  much  below,  and  with  a  dip  of  74°  southerly. 
It  was  likewise  opened  at  its  "  spoon  of  the  basin  "  580  yards  to  the 
west,  and  found  to  have  there  a  thickness  of  17  inches,  with  a  dip 
of  7°  southerly.  Likewise,  again,  it  was  opened  35  yards  south  of 
that,  and  found  to  have  a  thickness  of  18  inches,  with  a  dip  of  6° 
easterly.  Another  hole  a  dozen  yards  further  south,  and  four  other 
holes  in  a  line  northward  from  the  last-described  hole  towards  the 
preceding  one  were  formerly  dug  on  the  same  bed,  but  are  now  in- 
accessible. The  same  bed  was  also  bored  through  at  the  old  dia- 
mond drill  hole,  the  second  coal  bed  from  the  top,  and  found  to  be 
about  11  inches  thick.  Of  course,  so  thin  a  bed  is  not  to  be  counted 
on  as  workable  within  the  tract,  though  it  is  barely  possible  that  the 
thickness  may  be  better  along  the  southern  outcrop  towards  the 
eastern  boundary. 

The  great  use  of  the  bed  here  is  its  aid  in  proving  the  geology  of 
the  tract.  Its  course  between  the  eastern  opening  and  the  northern 
one  at  the  "  spoon  of  the  basin  "  is  so  closely  parallel  with  that  of 
the  Mammoth  bed,  well  indicated  by  the  numerous  trial  shafts,  and 
the  steepness  of  the  dip  leaves  so  little  room  for  question,  and  the 
correspondence  in  distance  apart  of  the  two  beds  in  every  cross  sec- 
tion is  so  exact,  and  the  opening  on  the  Primrose  bed  comes  in  so 
perfectly  as  confirmation,  that  no  doubt  whatever  can  remain  of  the 
identity  of  the  beds  of  the  diamond  drill  hole,  which  by  their  per- 
fect agreement  give  still  further  corrobo ration.  The  perfect  agree- 
ment again  of  the  same  beds  in  the  cross  sections  half  a  mile  to  the 
south  makes  the  identification  yet  more  convincing,  if  possible.  In 
addition,  there  is  further  corroboration  in  the  position  at  all  points 
of  the  coal  bed  next  to  be  described. 

"  Top  Split  of  the  Mammoth" — The  bed  that  is  hereabouts,  some- 


—  25  — 

times  called  the  Top  Split  of  the  Mammoth,  and  sometimes  the  Seven 
Foot  bed,  seems  to  be  everywhere,  from  the  Palmer  tunnel  through 
the  tract  to  the  Potts  and  Sillyman  mines  on  the  southwest,  so  very 
closely  at  a  uniform  distance  of  90  feet  above  the  main  Mammoth 
bed,  center  to  center,  as  perhaps  hardly  to  justify  calling  it  a  split  of 
this  bed.  That  uniformity  of  distance  at  so  many  points  is  a  valu- 
able confirmation  of  the  geological  explanation  of  the  tract. 

The  so-called  split  has  the  past  season  been  opened  on  the  log 
road  just  off  from  the  Mahanoy  City  or  Locust  Valley  road,  and 
had  there  the  following  section,  from  above  downward  : 

Ft.  Ins. 

Black  slate,     ..........  0  „  1 

COAL,      ...........  0,,  4 

Coaly  black  clay,  "  clod,"        .        .        .        .        .        .        .  1  „  3 

COAL,      ...........  1  „  0 

Black  slate,     ......        .  .        .  0  „  1 

COAL,      ......        .....  2  „  5 

Clay,       ...........  1  „  6 

Reddish  gray  sand-rock,          .......  2  „  6 

9,,    2 

The  coal,  then,  is  3  feet  9  inches  thick,  within  a  total  thickness 
of  5  feet  1  inch.  The  coal  is  of  very  good  quality,  though  somewhat 
unfavorably  affected  by  atmospheric  influences.  The  hole  is  a  shaft 
19  feet  deep  prolonged  into  a  slope  on  the  coal  bed  23  feet  long. 

The  same  coal  bed  was  also  opened  last  summer  inside  the  south- 
west corner  of  the  tract,  and  had  the  following  section  from  above 
downward  : 

Ft.      Ins. 
Reddish  gray  sand-rock,  exposed    .....         .     0  ,,     6 

Black  dirt,  rotten  COAL,          .......    1  „    4 

COAL,  hard  and  good,      .........     2  „    0 

Black  fire-clay,  exposed,  about        .         .         .         .         .         .     0  ,,     6 


4  „    6 

The  coal  here,  then,  is  at  least  2  feet  thick  ;  but  apparently  the 
black  dirt  above  it  is  merely  coal,  perhaps  somewhat  slaty,  decom- 
posed by  atmospheric  influences,  and  should  be  added  to  the  rest, 
making  a  thickness  of  3  feet  4  inches,  in  the  same  total  thickness. 

At  the  old  diamond  drill  hole,  a  thickness  of  only  about  9  inches 
was  found  for  this  bed  according  to  the  record.  It  is,  of  course,  not 
impossible  that  the  bed  should  be  thinner  there  ;  but  it  is  also  per- 
haps possible  that  a  portion  of  the  bed  may  have  been  overlooked. 
At  the  Palmer  tunnel,  this  bed  is  given  by  Rogers  (vol.  ii.,  p.  103) 
as  5J  feet  thick  ;  and  by  the  present  State  Geological  Survey's  South- 


—  26  — 

era  Coal  Field  Columnar  Section  Sheet  IV.,  as  5  feet.  The  same 
sheet  gives  it  as  5  feet  and  5  feet  2  inches  in  two  tunnels  at  Buck- 
ville,  and  as  4  feet  10  inches  at  the  Northdale  tunnel,  and  4  feet  at 
the  Kaska  William  shaft. 

It  is  certain  then,  that  the  bed  is  of  workable  thickness  and  qual- 
ity on  the  tract  at  the  log  road,  and  on  the  whole  quite  probably  so 
all  over  its  area  on  the  tract  with  an  average  thickness  of  3J  feet 
(the  mean  of  3  feet  9  inches  and  3  feet  4  inches).  As  the  portion 
of  the  tract  underlain  by  the  bed  is  81  acres,  and  the  area  of  the  bed 
itself  (allowing  for  the  basin  shape)  is  102J  acres  there  would  be,  at 
a  thickness  of  3J  feet,  710,000  tons. 

Drift  Coal  Bed. — The  Drift  coal  bed  was  formerly  opened  by  the 
old  drift,  84  yards  long,  just  east  of  Little  Creek  ;  and  is  of  good 
quality;  and  had  there  a  thickness  of  20  to  30  inches.  Its  section 
is  shown  in  the  figure  of  the  Mammoth  bed  columnar  sections. 

The  same  bed  was  the  past  season  opened  52  feet  north  of  Blew's 
eastern  slope,  at  a  geological  depth  of  about  45  feet  below  the  Mam- 
moth bed  ;  and  had  the  following  section,  from  above  downward  : 

Ft.  Ins. 

Black  dirt,  0  to  3  inches,  say, 0  „  1£ 

Black  hard  fire-clay, 1  „  3 

COAL,  rotten,  1  foot  8  inches  to  2  feet  6  inches,  say,          .        .     2  „  1 

3  "    5J 

The  bed,  then,  has  a  mean  of  2  feet  1  inch  of  coal,  in  one  bench. 
Although  a  bed  of  coal  of  good  quality,  as  seen  in  the  long  drift  just 
mentioned,  it  shows  here  the  great  power  of  atmospheric  influences  at 
the  very  bottom  of  the  hole.  The  hole  is  about  8  feet  deep,  prolonged 
22  feet  further  in  a  slope  on  the  bed.  The  dip  is  58°  southerly. 

The  same  bed  was  opened  formerly  at  the  tunnel  close  by  Silly- 
man's  slope,  half  a  mile  south  of  the  tract,  and  was  a  few  years  ago 
still  accessible,  and  was  measured  by  Mr.  F.  A.  Hill,  then  in  charge 
of  the  anthracite  survey  of  the  State  Geological  Survey,  as  follows, 
from  above  downward  : 

Ft.      Ins. 

Slate,      .        .        .        , 0  ,,     6 

COAL,  shelly, 0  „    4 

COAL, 0  „    5 

COAL,  shelly,  .        . 0  „    3 

Fire-clay,  soft, 1  „     8 

Hardslate, 1  „     2 

COAL,  shelly, .        .        .     1  „  10 

COAL, 1  „    0 

COAL,  shelly, 1  „    4 

Slate  bottom. 

8  „    6 


—  27  — 

The  bed  then,  contains  here  5  feet  2  inches  of  coal  within  a  total 
thickness  of  8  feet. 

The  bed  was  formerly  opened  at  three  holes  south  of  Big  Creek 
within  a  quarter  of  a  mile  west  of  the  southwest  corner  of  the  tract; 
but  they  are  inaccessible  and  there  is  no  record  of  the  thickness  of 
coal  found. 

The  bed  is  no  doubt  the  same  as  the  one  called  the  Skidmore  at 
Morea,  with  a  total  thickness  of  3  feet  6  inches,  and  at  New  Boston, 
with  a  thickness  of  5  feet  4  inches  within  a  total  of  6  feet  4  inches, 
an  average  of  four  well -scattered  sections. 

It  is  therefore,  by  no  means  improbable  that,  although  the  bed  is 
at  present  not  of  workable  thickness  at  the  old  drift  and  at  Blew's 
slopes,  yet  some  portions  of  the  extent  of  the  bed  within  the  tract 
may  hereafter  be  found  to  be  3  feet  or  more  in  thickness.  Even  the 
average  at  those  two  places,  2  feet  and  1  inch,  with  coal  of  such 
good  quality  may  prove  to  be  workable  at  some  not  extremely  dis- 
tant day. 

It  underlies  98J  acres  of  the  tract,  with  122  acres  of  the  bed 
itself;  and  at  an  average  thickness  of  3  feet  would  contain  720,000 
tons. 

Spring  Coal  Bed. — The  Spring  coal  bed  was  opened  last  summer 
at  a  trial  shaft  65  feet  northerly  from  the  western  opening  of  the 
Buck  Mountain  bed,  and  the  following  section  was  measured  from 
above  downward : 

Ft.    Ins. 

Conglomerate, 

COAL,  rotten, 3  „  0 

Hard  rock,        .  

The  coal  was  still  soft  and  rotten,  from  the  effect  of  atmospheric 
influences,  particularly  the  percolating  water;  but  at  a  greater  depth 
will  probably  prove  to  be  firm  coal.  The  hole  was  a  vertical  shaft 
20J  feet  deep.  The  dip  was  perhaps  80J°  southerly. 

No  other  opening  of  the  bed  is  known  in  the  immediate  neighbor- 
hood of  the  tract ;  but,  as  already  mentioned,  the  bed  is  known  at 
Morea. 

The  Spring  coal  bed  underlies  about  155  acres  of  the  tract;  or, 
allowing  for  the  basin  shape,  has  an  area  of  about  191  acres  of  bed 
surface ;  and,  if  its  thickness  should  average  three  feet,  as  it  was 
found  at  the  only  opening  on  the  tract,  would  contain  1,130,000 
tons. 


—  28  — 


Lykens  Valley  Coal  Bed. — The  Lykens  Valley  coal  bed  has  never 
been  opened  on  the  tract  nor  anywhere  near  it,  and  its  thickness  here 
is  quite  unknown.  At  New  Boston  it  has  a  thickness  of  about  2 
feet  7  inches.  Near  Tamaqua  it  was  opened  by  a  long  drift ;  but 
there  appears  to  be  no  record  of  the  thickness. 

It  is  then,  perhaps  safe  to  count  on  a  thickness  of  2J  feet  for  the 
bed  here;  and  as  it  underlies  the  whole  tract,  there  would  be, 
allowing  for  the  basin-shape,  about  257 J  acres  of  the  bed,  or  1,270,- 
000  tons. 

The  quality  of  the  coal  of  this  bed  is  reckoned  very  good,  and  it 
may  therefore  be  found  to  be  workable  at  no  very  distant  day.  Its 
least  depth  below  the  surface  of  the  ground,  in  the  valley  of  Little 
Creek  at  the  northern  edge  of  the  tract  would  be  about  250  feet ;  and 
its  greatest  depth  at  the  bottom  of  the  basin  on  the  eastern  edge  of 
the  tract  would  be  about  1275  feet. 

5.  SUMMARY  OF  WORKABLE  COAL. 

The  coal  of  the  three  principal  beds  may  be  summarized  in  the 
following  table : 


BED. 

Average 
Thickness. 

Horizontal, 
Acres. 

Bed 

Surface, 
Acres. 

Tons 
in  all. 

Tons  above 
1000  foot 
Level. 

Mammoth  

8 
10 
6 

95 
115 
148 

126 
143£ 
182£ 

1,990,000 
2,840,000 
2,170,000 

830,COO 
1.400,000 
850,000 

Ten  Foot   

Buck  Mountain 

24 

148 

452 

7,000,000 

3,080,000 

To  that  amount  might  be  added  the  following  : 

Orchard 

6 
3* 
3 
3 
2* 

Acres. 
4 

81 
98£ 
155 

208 

Acres. 
5 

102J 
122 
191 
257£ 

60,000 
710,000 
720,000 
1,130,000 
1,270,000 

Probably. 
Perhaps. 
Possibly. 
Perhaps. 
Perhaps. 

Top  Split  of  Mammoth  
Drift  (or  Skidmore)     

Spring                    . 

Lykens  Valley  

15 

208 

678 

3,890,000 

If  this  last  more  or  less  doubtful  amount  should  be  counted,  the 
tract  would  have  a  total  of  10,890,000  tons. 


—  29  — 

6.  MINING  AND  SHIPMENT. 

It  is  seen  from  the  map,  as  well  as  from  the  foregoing  pages,  that 
the  coal  of  the  tract  is  still  practically  untouched,  as  far  as  mining  is 
concerned;  that  the  three  principal  beds  lie  wholly  within  850  feet 
of  the  surface  and  the  Mammoth  within  700  feet  of  it;  that  over 
3,000,000  tons  of  the  whole  amount  are  above  the  level  of  1000  feet 
above  the  sea ;  that  this  level  is  about  that  of  the  old  Kentucky 
Bank  main  drainage  gangway  at  the  eastern  boundary  of  the  tract, 
and  is  also  accessible  by  a  tunnel  420  yards  long  from  Little  Creek, 
500  yards  long  from  Big  Creek,  or  1000  yards  long  from  Swift 
Creek;  that  a  very  large  share  of  each  bed  has  comparatively  gentle 
dips,  and  no  part  of  them  has  steeper  dips  than  are  common  through- 
out the  southern  anthracite  field,  with  seldom  an  approach  to  verti- 
cality  and  never  an  overturning ;  that  the  beds  are  not  generally  of 
such  great  thickness  as  to  occasion  a  large  percentage  of  waste  in 
mining ;  and  that  there  is  no  evidence  whatever  of  any  faults,  none 
even  of  small  ones. 

The  nearest  existing  railroad  line  is  shown  at  the  southern  edge  of 
the  map,  a  siding  of  the  Philadelphia  and  Reading  Railroad  f  of  a 
mile  from  Brockville  station,  and  f  of  a  mile  by  Little  Creek  val- 
ley from  the  middle  of  the  main  basin  of  the  coal-beds.  Brockville 
station  is  by  rail  9  miles  from  Mt.  Carbon,  and  102  miles  from 
Philadelphia;  6  miles  from  Tamaqua,  22  miles  from  Mauch  Chunk, 
143  miles  from  Jersey  City. 

The  tract  might  be  approached  from  the  Reading  Railroad  Line 
by  Little  Creek  or  Big  Creek ;  or  by  a  line  2f  miles  long  from  750 
yards  above  Brockville  over  the  old  grading,  1 J  mile  long,  past  the 
Swift  Creek  mines  ;  or  by  a  line  2|  miles  long  from  700  yards  above 
Tuscarora  over  the  old  grading,  1^  miles  long,  past  the  Kentucky 
Bank  mines,  and  thence  by  a  nearly  level  route  to  the  tract. 

The  central  part  of  the  main  basin  of  the  tract,  is  5  miles  from 
the  Pennsylvania  Railroad  at  the  Morea  breaker,  over  a  not  very 
uneven  country  ;  and  likewise  4  miles  from  New  Boston  Junction. 

It  is  also  3  miles  in  a  straight  line  from  the  Central  Railroad  of 
New  Jersey  at  East  Mahanoy  Tunnel. 

7.  MAP  AND  SECTIONS. 

The  cross-sections  printed  herewith  give  additional  confirmation 
of  the  geological  structure  shown  in  the  map,  and  show  that  all 
the  important  beds  have  been  opened  south  of  the  Mine  Hill  anti- 


30  — 


clinal,  and  that  they  almost  invariably  maintain  with  remarkable 
precision  the  same  distance  apart  from  one  another  as  on  the  tract 
and  at  the  Palmer  Tunnel. 

The  outlines  of  the  tract,  the  important  roads  and  trial  pits  were 
laid  down  on  the  map  by  Mr.  Howell  T.  Fisher  under  the  direction 
of  Mr.  A.  DW.  Smith  from  a  very  accurate  transit  survey  made 
by  Mr.  Fisher  last  summer,  with  rectangular  co-ordinates  computed 


SCALE 

8OO    FEET   TO  AN 


and  closing  extremely  well ;  and  he  also  computed  the  area  of  the 
tract  from  them.  Mr.  Charles  J.  Wright,  likewise  under  Mr. 
Smith's  special  guidance,  did  much  surveying  of  the  other  features, 
adding  to  the  work  already  done  by  the  State  Geological  Survey. 
Mr.  Wright  drew  the  contour  lines,  copying  the  topography  from 
the  original  note  books,  with  my  own  supervision  and  correction. 
I  worked  out  the  final  details  of  the  geology  and  drew  the  outcrops, 
the  equidistant  strike  curves  and  the  cross-sections,  aided  by  Mr. 
Smith's  very  intelligent  criticism,  and  everywhere  with  our  full  final 
agreement. 

The  map  was  drawn  on   a  scale  of  300  feet  to  an  inch,  and  in 
photo-lithographing  was  reduced  to  800  feet  to  an  inch. 

We  have  a  strong  personal  interest  in  the  tract ;  but,  of  course,  our 
professional  reputation  is,  still  more  important  to  us,  and  the  facts 


01 

—  ox  — • 

have  been  set  down  impartially  and  correctly,  it  is  believed;  and, 
at  any  rate,  they  can  readily  be  verified  by  any  skilled  geologist.  Any 
such  expert  will  surely  admit  our  deductions  from  the  facts  to  be  in- 
contestable, and  to  give  not  merely  the  most  natural  explanation  but 
the  only  possible  consistent  one.  The  former  bad  success  of  explo- 
rations on  the  tract,  with  so  many  barren  trial  pits  now  clearly  seen 
to  be  within  a  few  feet  of  excellent  coal  beds,  has  forced  us  to  make 
the  present  exploration  much  more  thorough  than  is  commonly  con- 
sidered necessary  before  the  actual  opening  of  mines,  and  has  required 
an  unusually  complete,  irrefutable  demonstration  in  the  report  and 
map. 

BENJ.  SMITH  LYMAJ?. 

708  LOCUST  STREET,  PHILADELPHIA,  January  18,  1893. 

I  concur  fully  in  the  foregoing  report, 

A.  DW.  SMITH. 

ROOM  18,  4TH  FLOOR,  POST  OFFICE  BUILDING,  PHILADELPHIA,  January  18, 1893. 


We  hold  the  Shippen  and  Wetherill  tract  under  an  option,  with 
the  expectation  of  completing  the  purchase,  and  anybody  desiring 
to  interest  himself  in  operating  the  tract,  or  to  lease,  or  buy  it,  may 

address  us  directly. 

BENJ.  SMITH  LYMAN, 

A.  DW.  SMITH. 

PHILADELPHIA,  January  18, 1893. 


[FROM  TRANSACTIONS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  INSTITUTE  OF  MINING  ENGINEERS.] 


AN  OCCURRENCE  OF  COARSE  CONGLOMERATE  ABOVE 
THE  MAMMOTH  ANTHRACITE-BLD. 

BY  BENJAMIN  SMITH  LYMAN,  PHILADELPHIA,  PA. 

(Schuylkill  Valley  Meeting,  Reading,  October,  1892.) 

IT  is  a  time-honored  saying  in  the  anthracite  region  that  "  under 
the  conglomerate  there  is  no  coal  ;"  and  the  adage  is  generally 
reckoned  a  sure  guide  in  coal-exploration.  Yet  there  are  many 
places  where  conglomerate,  even  coarse  conglomerate,  occurs  above 
important  coal  beds,  and,  among  others,  above  the  great  Mammoth 
bed.  One  of  the  most  striking  of  such  occurrences  is  on  the  Shippen 
and  Wetherill  tract,  half  a  dozen  miles  west  of  Tamaqua;  and  it 
illustrates  remarkably  the  disastrous  effect  of  a  too  unquestioning 
blind  confidence  in  the  sweeping  literal  truth  of  a  broad  generaliza- 
tion. 

Here  there  is  a  conspicuous  crag  formed  by  a  twenty-foot  bed  of 
egg-conglomerate,  dipping  60  degrees  southerly,  and  jutting  out 
boldly  at  the  western  end  of  a  Kill,  where  it  is  cut  through  by  the 
small  stream  of  Little  Creek.  The  hill  runs  eastward  for  half  a 
mile,  with  occasional  exposures  of  pebbly  rock  along  the  western  half 
of  the  crest.  Eastward  from  the  exposures  lies  the  old  Kentucky 
Bank  mine,  abandoned  thirty  years  ago,  where  the  Mammoth  bed 
was  worked  down  to  water-level  through  a  space  of  a  mile  and  a 
quarter  westward  from  the  Palmer  tunnel  to  the  very  edge  of  the 
Shippen  and  Wetherill  tract,  apparently  just  below  where  the  east- 
ern prolongation  of  the  same  conglomerate  should  be,  though,  in  fact, 
it  is  not  exposed.  Indeed,  in  the  Palmer  tunnel  itself,  its  place  is 
recorded  in  Rogers's  Final  State  Geological  Report  of  1858,  vol  ii., 
p.  103,  as  filled  by  "  hard  pebbly  rock." 

Many,  however,  doubted  whether  the  Mammoth  could  continue 
undisturbed  westward  under  the  egg-conglomerate  crags.  It  was 
believed  by  many  that  there  must  be  a  great  fault  that  had  brought 
up  the  coarse  Pottsville  conglomerate  of  the  bottom  of  the  produc- 
tive coal-measures,  and  had  cut  off  all  southern  extension  of  the 
Mammoth  ;  and  that  even  the  Buck  Mountain  bed  and  its  compan- 
ions, that  should  overlie  that  conglomerate,  had  been  reduced  in 
thickness  to  the  insignificant  beds  that  were  found  there. 

A  few  were  more  hopeful,  and  tried  to  prove  the  continued  exist- 


—  33  — 

ence  of  the  Mammoth  by  actual  opening.  About  five  years  ago,  it 
is  said,  two  brothers,  who  owned  a  farm,  spent  their  whole  substance 
vainly  in  persistent  efforts  with  trial-shafts  and  drifts  to  open  the 
Mammoth  bed,  just  north  of  the  westernmost  egg-cpngloraerate  crag, 
and  some  25  feet  geologically  below  it.  Their  best  success  was 
to  find  a  seam  of  coal  there,  which  they  took  to  be  the  Mammoth,  and 
upon  which  they  drifted  eastward  for  more  than  eighty  yards;  but 
it  was  only  20  inches  thick,  swelling  up  in  places  to  30  inches. 
Had  they  dug  only  ten  feet  higher  in  the  measures,  they  would 
have  found  the  Mammoth  bed  with  a  thickness  of  about  18  feet, 
with  15  feet  7  inches  of  coal,  where  it  was  opened  last  week. 

Two  or  three  years  after  their  failure,  an  unsuccessful  attempt  was 
made  by  others,  at  an  expense  of  four  or  five  thousand  dollars,  they 
say,  to  find  the  Mammoth  by  boring  with  a  diamond-drill,  200 
yards  southward  from  the  egg-conglomerate  crag.  After  boring 
through  two  or  three  coal  beds  of  trifling  thickness,  a  great  mass  of 
conglomerate,  and  at  length  a  few  feet  of  sandstone,  the  hole  was 
abandoned  in  despair  at  the  depth  of  470  feet.  A  comparison  of  the 
drill  section  with  that  of  the  Palmer  tunnel  shows  that  less  than  30 
feet  more  would  have  reached  the  top  of  the  Mammoth  bed.  The 
upper  beds  are,  it  is  true,  remarkably  reduced  in  thickness;  but  they 
are  in  their  appropriate  places,  and  have  now  recently  been  proved 
of  like  small  thickness,  with  quite  consistent  dips,  by  trial-shafts  on 
the  outcrop. 

Indeed  the  geological  structure  has  been  fully  demonstrated  to  be 
essentially  what  the  State  Geological  Survey  map  (Mine-Sheet  V.), 
published  two  or  three  years  ago,  showed  it  to  be,  in  the  face  of  the 
conflicting  opinions  then  rife.  The  crag  in  question  is  on  the  north 
side  of  a  basin  that  is  bounded  on  the  south  by  the  Mine  Hill 
anticlinal,  rapidly  sinking  to  the  east.  The  mere  topography  shows 
that  the  conglomerate-beds  above  the  Mammoth  extend  350  yards 
westward  from  the  crag,  though  less  prominent  there ;  then  bend 
round,  in  shape  like  the  end  of  a  spoon,  forming  the  divide  between 
Little  Creek  and  Big  Creek ;  then  pass  eastward  again,  making  a 
decided  ridge  with  low  cliffs ;  and  soon  again  bend  southward,  and 
even  westward,  round  the  Mine  Hill  anticlinal  to  the  neighborhood 
of  the  old  Potts  and  Sillyman  slopes,  just  north  of  Patterson.  On 
the  Locust  Valley  road  up  the  hill,  past  the  old  Mammoth  working 
of  those  mines,  there  are  ample  exposures  of  the  conglomerate-beds 
in  question ;  only  the  pebbles  are  smaller  than  at  the  crag,  though 
in  part  as  large  as  walnuts.  Nowhere  is  there  any  tiling  whatever 

3 


—  34  — 

to  indicate  the  existence  of  any  such  great  fault  as  was  imagined  to 
account  for  the  egg-conglomerate  of  the  crag. 

This  is  a  case  in  which  the  needless  resort  to  a  fault  to  account  for 
appearances,  as  .if  a  fault  were  the  commonest  and  easiest  thing  in 
the  world,  has  led  to  heavy  pecuniary  loss.  For,  as  the  fault  ex- 
plained so  readily  the  repeated  failure  to  work  out  the  geology  of  the 
tract,  it  very  naturally  led  to  a  general  belief  among  the  (not  too 
geological)  business  community  that  the  tract  contained  but  a  small 
fraction  of  the  coal  now  proved  really  to  exist  there;  and  conse- 
quently no  capitalist  could  be  found  willing  to  purchase  it,  even  at  a 
very  low  price. 

There  are  numerous  other  places  where  coarse  conglomerate  is 
found  within  a  short  distance  above  the  Mammoth  bed.  Conspicu- 
ous among  them  is  the  Silver  Creek  district,  only  four  miles  west  of 
the  Shippen  and  Wetherill  tract.  Rogers's  Final  Report,  1858, 
vol.  ii.,  p.  228,  speaks  of  "  the  egg-  and  nut-conglomerate  which 
overlies  "  what  is  now  known  to  be  the  Mammoth  bed.  See  also  his 
Silver  Creek  section  on  Plate  1  of  vol.  ii.  The  assistants  of  the 
first  Geological  Survey  were  at  first  much  puzzled  by  the  conglo- 
merate thereabouts,  as  they  were  then  tyros ;  and  they  too  devised 
faults  to  explain  the  observed  facts;  but  later,  with  increased  experi- 
ence, they  understood  better.  Rogers,  further  on  (p.  229),  speaks 
of  the  corresponding  rock  beds  on  Mill  creek  as  "coarse  pebbly 
sandstone." 

On  the  Riehle  tract,  next  west  of  Morea,  there  is  exposed  a  great 
ledge  of  coarse  conglomerate,  overlying  the  Mammoth  bed,  which 
was  formerly  opened  some  20  feet  thick  at  not  many  yards  distance. 

At  the  Otto  colliery,  near  Branchdale,  the  occurrence  of  an  ex- 
tremely coarse  conglomerate  between  two  splits  of  the  Mammoth 
bed  gave  rise  to  much  controversy  as  to  the  identity  of  the  beds ;  and 
the  question  was  only  settled  by  actual  mining. 

Many  other  cases  of  conglomerate  over  the  Mammoth  may  be  seen 
marked  on  Sheets  IV.,  V.,  VI.,  IX.,  and  X.,  of  the  State  Geo- 
logical Survey's  Atlas  of  the  Southern  Anthracite  Coal-Field,  as 
follow : 

At  Kaska  William  colliery,  between  the  middle  (or  "  upper  ") 
and  lower  splits  of  the  Mammoth  u conglomerate."  Sh.  IV.,  Sect. 
15. 

At  St.  Clair  shaft,  over  the  Seven-Foot  (or  top  split  of  the  Mam- 
moth) "conglomerate."  Sh.  V.,  Sect,  7. 

At  Thomaston  colliery,  over  the  Daniel  bed  (or  lower  split  of  the 


—  35  — 

Mammoth),  in  the  water-level  tunnel,  much  "conglomerate,"  and 
"  hard  conglomerate. "  Sh.  VI.,  Sect.  6,  Also  at  the  first  lift,  much 
"  conglomerate."  Sh.  VI.,  Sect.  9. 

At  the  Oakdale  colliery,  over  the  same  bed,  at  shaft-level,  much 
"conglomerate."  Sh.  VI.,  Sect.  10. 

At  Payne's  colliery,  over  the  same  bed,  much  "conglomerate." 
Sh.  VI.,  Sect.  13. 

At  Richardson's  colliery,  over  the  same  bed,  a  little  "  conglom- 
erate." Sh.  VI.,  Sect.  14. 

At  Greenwood  tunnel,  over  the  same  bed,  "  very  hard  conglom- 
erate." Sh.  VI.,  Sect.  17. 

At  South  Pine  colliery  (near  the  Otto),  over  the  top  split  of  the 
Mammoth,  "  conglomerate,"  24J  feet.  Sh.  X.,'  Sect.  2. 

At  the  Middle  Creek  colliery,  over  the  same  bed,  "  conglomerate." 
Sh.  X.,  Sect.  3. 

At  the  Colket  colliery,  over  the  Four- Foot  bed  (or  top  split  of  the 
Mammoth),  "  fine  conglomerate."  Sh.  X.,  Sect.  6. 

At  the  East  Franklin  colliery,  over  the  Mammoth,  "conglom- 
erate." Sh.  X.,  sect.  9  and  10. 

Also,  at  the  same  colliery,  over  the  Blackheath  (or  Holmes)  bed, 
"coarse  conglomerate/'  18  feet,  and  "fine  conglomerate,"  19  feet. 
Sh.  X.,  Sect.  9. 

At  the  Good  Spring  colliery,  over  the  same  bed,  "  coarse  conglom- 
erate," 7  feet.  Sh.  X.,  Sect.  9. 

These  instances,  from  the  southern  field  alone,  are  enough  to  show 
that  it  is  by  no  means  a  rare  exception  for  the  sand-rock  above  the 
Mammoth  to  become  pebbly,  and  even  to  be  a  coarse  or  extremely 
coarse  conglomerate. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  inquire  what  might  have  been  the  cause 
of  the  laying  down  of  beds  of  such  hoarse  material,  that  must  have 
been  moved  by  violent  currents  during  comparatively  short  intervals, 
in  the  midst  of  the  generally  very  quiet  deposition  of  the  Coal- 
measures.  It  is,  however,  imaginable,  that  the  temporary  obstruc- 
tion of  a  sea-channel  in  one  direction  might  cause  a  very  rapid  cur- 
rent in  some  other  direction ;  or,  the  current  might  arise  from  the 
removal  of  some  obstruction.  It  would  not  be  necessary  that  the 
obstruction,  or  its  removal,  should  occur  through  any  especially  vio- 
lent earth  movements.  A  channel  might,  by  degrees,  become  ob- 
structed with  silt  or  sand,  or  another  might,  by  gradual  denudation, 
become  sufficiently  opened  for  the  passage  of  currents  that  would 
rapidly  enlarge  it. 


—  36  — 

In  any  case,  the  causes  of  the  coarse  conglomerates  would  seem  to 
have  had  no  influence  upon  the  thickness  of  the  coal  beds  a  few  yards 
beneath,  as  is  amply  seen  in  the  cases  just  described  ;  and  none  upon 
beds  equally  near  above,  as  is  shown  by  the  good  thickness  of  the 
Buck  Mountain  coal  bed,  one  of  the  thickest  anthracite  coal  beds, 
though  close  over  the  Potts ville  conglomerate ;  the  variable  thickness 
of  the  coal  not  seeming  to  correspond  in  the  least  with  the  coarseness 
or  fineness  of  the  pebbles. 


GAYLAMOUNT 

PAMPHLET  BINDER 

•^ 

ManufactuttJ  bit 

GAYLORD  BROS.  IM.  ] 

Syracuf*,  N.  Y. 

Stockton,  Cali*. 


Z 


